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1. What is Sweet Spot Training?

 

Sweet Spot is the zone right under your Functional Threshold Power, the ranges are from 91% to 97% of your FTP. Sweet Spot intervals start at 5 min. and goes even to hours for best professional cyclists. For amateur cyclist we wouldn’t recommend longer then 120 min total time, it means for example 4 x 30 min or 2 x 60 min in Sweet Spot zone. Length on intervals should be base on your goals and main races you are doing during the season.

Total Time in Sweet Spot Zone

per workout by the level of advancement and period of the season

Road Cycling Base Build Race
Beginner 15 30 45
Cat 4 30 45 60
Cat 3 45 60 80
Cat 2 60 75 100
Cat 1 60 90 120
Cyclocross Base Build Race
Beginner 15 30 30
Cat 4 30 45 30
Cat 3 45 60 45
Cat 2 60 90 60
Cat 1 60 120 60

2. Sweet Spot Ranges

 

Intervals for Sweet Spot zone starts from 5 min and getting to even more than 120 min for professional athletes.

Base on your goal race you can adjust the length of your intervals to your needs. If you are beginner cyclist, starting your adventure with more professional training plan we would recommend to start with 3 x 5 min intervals in the range of 91% – 97% of your Functional Threshold Power or 94% – 97% of your Functional Threshold Heart Rate.

Many kinds of research are saying about 93% like the best place to stay to improve your FTP. It is not possible to keep 93% all the time, that is why you should be trying to stay in those ranges. If 3 x 5 min intervals workout is not a challenge for you anymore try to increase the time of every interval by 3-5 min, you can do 3 x 8 min, 3 x 12 min and so on. You should be doing 1-2 Sweet Spot training during the week, always consider specification of your races and the actual level of endurance.

More advanced cyclist we would recommend to start with 4 x 10 min intervals and adjust them to the length on the races you are preparing for. For example, the longest Cyclocross races are 1 hour, so your total time in the Sweet Spot zone should be getting to 60 min, 4 x 15 min = 60 min. With time you can decrease the number of intervals and increase the time, for example, 2 x 30 min.

Power and heart rate zones for Sweet Spot workouts are:

• 91% – 97% of Functional Threshold Power.
• 94% – 97% of Functional Threshold Heart Rate.

If you don’t know your FTP or FTHR go to this article to set up one for you.

Time range of interval is:

• 5 – 120 minutes.

Number of intervals in one workout:

• 2 – 4 intervals.

3. Sweet Spot Workouts and Improvement

 

Examples of Sweet Spot workouts, to improve your Functional Threshold Power. Below you can find 2 workouts for beginners and more advanced cyclists, both of them are available to download, base on power and heart rate zones.

Beginner workout:

• Start with easy 10 min warm-up
• 3 x 1 min – cadence 120
• 10 min active ride – 70% of FTP
• 3 x 7 min – 91% – 97% of FTP with 3 min easy between
• 15 min recovery

Advance workout:

• Start with easy 10 min warm-up
• 3 x 1 min – cadence 120
• 10 min active ride – 70% of FTP
• 4 x 15 min – 91% – 97% of FTP with 3 min easy between
• 15 min recovery

Leave a comment below if you have any questions.

Coach Damian

Damian is a head coach and founder of Cyklopedia, which was created with one goal to help everyone be faster cyclists by structured training plans, healthy recipes, and nutrition plans. Damian is racing and coaching for over 10 years, working with athletes all around the world.

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